


A Surrogate for Immortality

by thedragonagelesbian



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Chocolate, M/M, Roses, Trans Duck Newton
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-27
Updated: 2019-05-27
Packaged: 2020-03-20 00:32:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18981517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedragonagelesbian/pseuds/thedragonagelesbian
Summary: Indrid gave Duck a box of chocolates. With it came some small hope after Duck lost everything else. So he tried to return the favor with a bouquet of roses. With it came only despair.(A very minor canon divergence in the form of hurried and vaguely romantic gestures)





	A Surrogate for Immortality

**Author's Note:**

> Hello TAZ fandom! This is my first time writing anything for this show, since I only started listening to Balance a few months ago. I binged all of Amnesty while moving out for the summer, and I'm absolutely and utterly in love. I knew I wanted to get something out before episode 28 came along and ruined any theories about Indrid's disappearance, so here y'all go!

When the door to his apartment finally gave, Duck Newton could feel his pulse between his eyes. As he stumbled inside, he didn’t bother turning on the lights; half-shut as his eyes were, it wouldn’t have made much of a difference. Instead, he acted on impulse, muscle memory. Keys dropped in the bowl of loose change. Shut the door behind him, grope around for the lock, and twist it sideways. Cue a spike in his headache, and he was halfway to the liquor cabinet, shoes already toed off and kicked into the closet.

He found himself at the kitchen table, staring at his faint reflection peering back at him from behind the glass. Despite the distortion, he could see the bags under his eyes. He let out a low groan, closed his eyes, and knocked back another shot. He shouldn’t be this tired. It wasn’t that late, and he knew that for sure because he had the world’s worst internal clock, and it let him divide his days into ‘before 6:14pm’ and ‘after’. And this was before.

But hell, he had spent half of the last week being ready at a moment’s notice to prevent catastrophic and fatal accidents. And he had spent the other half of that time fighting shit that had no right trying to attack him in the first place. Goats. A tree. His own murderously inclined sword. Was that not all enough to earn him the right to be tired?

He poured himself another shot, and as he lifted the glass to his lips, he muttered, “Wonder if Minnie’s willing to take the night off.”

Probably not.

Duck threw his head back. The vodka he was nursing hit the back of his throat so hard he reeled, gasping. The glass fell out of his hand while he sputtered and choked. It rolled in a lazy arc across the table. When the cough died down, he grasped after the glass, but his hand hit something else instead. Something was sitting on top of the table, red in color, boxy in shape, but the longer he stared at it, the blurrier his vision went. He couldn’t make it out.

It was only when he heard the glass hit the floor with a shatter that he finally pulled himself to attention. He blinked hard and reached up to rub at his eyes. When he set his hands down again, he finally knew what was sitting across from him: a heart-shaped box of chocolates.

At that realization, his stomach growled. With a wince, he wondered when he had last eaten, and if it was bad that he couldn’t remember. How hungry did you even have to be anyway that a box of cheap truffles made your glands start pumping saliva like crazy?

“More important question,” Duck pulled the box close while he mumbled to himself, “who broke into my house and left it here?”

The answer came quick in the form of a post-it note taped to the top of the box.

_ Duck Newton, _

_ Thank you for saving my life;-- consider this part of my repayment. I knew you’d like the heart.  _

_ I am sorry about what comes next. _

_ -Indrid Cold _

Duck ran his fingers across the note, idly toying with the edge of the post-it. He gave it a few flicks as he reread the message. Obsessing over 25 words may be the definition of making a mountain out of molehills, but when those words came from Indrid, what choice did he have but to scrutinize? Even without the cryptic last line, there was enough vaguely flirtatious content to give Duck stewing material for days. Weeks if he threw in some self-doubt. 

And then, of course, there  _ was _ the last line. Sorry. Sorry about what?

He would find out soon enough.

“Duck.” He let out a soft groan and lifted his head. Leo Tarkesian was standing over him, one hand on Duck’s shoulder and wearing a grimace. “C’mon, kid, you should eat somethin’.”

“’m not a kid.”

The headache behind Duck’s eyes hadn’t gone away. In fact, in the hour or so since he had read Indrid’s letter (and that was a big  _ so _ because he stopped processing the passage of time somewhere in there), it had spread throughout his entire body. Everything ached, perhaps none more than his stomach, which sat empty and burning. 

Although his back was a close second; laying in fetal position on a hardwood floor for an hour (or so) wasn’t doing wonders for the old spine.

Leo swore under his breath, and the warmth against Duck’s shoulder disappeared. “Alright. You won’t get up? I’ll bring something to you.”

He heard retreating footsteps, and then a pause. “Hey, you want these?” Duck lifted his head towards the noise. Leo was standing beside the table, holding the heart-shaped box of chocolates. He gave them a small shake. “Looks like your boyfriend dropped them off for ya.”

“Not my boyfriend.”

But Duck found himself stirring nonetheless. Call him sentimental or lonely or both, but in that moment, he began to uncurl. He rolled over onto his back and felt the cool wood panel through his sweat-soaked shirt. And he wondered what it would be like, to date Indrid. A man he had known for only a handful of days, and Duck had never been one for casual dating. He had never found the best way to slip gender into the “dinner and a movie” formula. It was a scary thought, letting a stranger in like that. Giving them that power over him.

But he was so scared now, and it would be different with Indrid. He knew that much. And he knew that Indrid knew even more. Maybe enough to keep him safe.

Duck let out a strangled noise at that, a wet chuckle catching on the ragged edges of his throat. It was funny, though. After all, he had been the one to save Indrid’s life just hours earlier. It also made sense. Indrid’s clairvoyance could be enough to steer Duck away from his own mortality, now that he couldn’t protect himself from it. He could be sure which threats were real, and which choices might end his life. It wasn’t a perfect surrogate for immortality, but by god, it had to be better than this doubt and uncertainty and anxiety and  _ fear _ which had been needling at him for the last hour (or so) until it had emptied him out to nothing.

“Yeah. Yeah, pass me the chocolates.”

Two days later, Duck was well-rested enough and presentable enough to leave the apartment again. If his full answering machine was any indication, dropping off the radar had caused his friends and his co-workers some concern. But they could all wait. Duck had a plan in mind, and he had to see it through first if he was ever going to get his head back on straight.

Flowers were hard to find in winter, particularly when a construction crew was still picking through the remains of the town’s general store. Duck was fortunate enough, however, to have some connections in the flora world. Before long, he had himself a bouquet of white roses. Something to suggest romance without seeming desperate.

The RV park looked just like he remembered it: empty, except for the one winnebago he knew to be Indrid’s. He half expected to see its door open, to find Indrid waiting for him. That’s what you do when you have foresight and you know someone you like is about to make a romantic gesture, right? That sounded right. Or maybe Indrid was being polite and had decided to let him to take the next step on his own.

Duck walked across the park, footsteps crunching in the snow. He came to a stop in front of the RV, and he stared at the door as his fingers fiddled with the stems of the roses. Anxiety began to crawl up his throat, and his breath came out in short pants.

“Indrid.” He spun one of the roses around between his thumb and forefinger, twisting and turning. “If you can see me now, just come out so I don’t lose my nerve, yeah?”

Duck’s words turned to foggy clouds and disappeared without a response.

The minutes ticked by in silence, until the cold started to seep through Duck’s jacket and up into his shoes. Nothing like a sharp gust of wind to remind one of their goals, and suddenly, the sweltering heat of Indrid’s winnebago seemed pretty inviting. Duck drew in a sharp breath, held it for seven beats, and knocked.

The door opened just as his fist touched it. Duck blinked, but he did not see Indrid waiting for him on the other side. In fact, he didn’t see anyone in the darkness— and it was dark inside. Indrid must not be home. With a frown and a sigh, Duck resolved to leave him a note saying he had dropped by. As he stepped inside, he felt something under the sole of his shoe. He lifted his leg and saw a bent, rusty screw under foot. Sitting right against the hinge, it must have been keeping the door slightly ajar.

The anxiety came back, inching down his spine. Duck blinked, shook his head, and took another step into the RV. He fumbled for a light switch, eyes never leaving the dark interior even as he groped the wall. He felt the plastic switch beneath his fingers and flicked it upwards.

Nothing happened.

And for the first time, Duck realized that the RV was silent.

The space heaters weren’t running.

Duck wished he could have said he spent the next several hours pouring over Indrid’s home, trying to deduce where he had gone and why. Maybe the speckled map of Kepler held a clue, or those graphite sketches. Maybe there was even a note explaining everything, sitting on a table inside, and all Duck had to do was pull out his flashlight and he’d see it and understand. Maybe this could all be chocked up to his nervous imagination. But there was also the voice in Duck’s mind that said maybe something really had happened. That he had to be the one to save Indrid’s life again. That he had to be the hero.

Of course, what Duck could actually say was simpler and sadder: wherever Indrid was, he would have a bouquet of white roses, carelessly dropped on his doormat, waiting for him when he came back. 

If he came back.


End file.
